Athlon KX133 Motherboard Roundup – A Nail-Biting Affair – THG.RU

Introduction

Friends of the AMD Athlon had to wait quite a long time: Until recently there used to be only AMD’s 750/Irongate chipset for Slot-A Athlon platforms. We especially described the rather weak performance of the AGP and memory interface in our previous tests. The Super Bypass was obviously not the appropriate remedy for speeding up the now quite tired AMD750/Irongate. Finally, VIA is offering the KX133 chipset that comes with modern features like AGP 4x and an asynchronous memory clock up to 133MHz. The new candidate sets high expectations on paper, but the support of upcoming CPUs has recently been castrated by VIA. The KX133 will not support Athlon’s successor code named Thunderbird anymore. VIA, who originally planned to offer this support, withdrew from it due to stability problems with Thunderbird prototypes. On the other hand, AMD will not supply large quantities of Slot-A Thunderbirds to the vendors. Thunderbirds, which incorporate L2 cache on-die instead of using external cache components, will primarily become available in Socket-A versions (462pins), which are driven by the new KZ133 (VT8363) chipset. The only way to power up the few remaining Slot-A Thunderbirds now is Grandpa Irongate – it’s quite embarrassing for VIA that they cannot offer upgradability for their KX133 chipset.

Patience Required – Not for the Faint-Hearted!

To say it right at the beginning: Compared to previous motherboard tests, this one really stressed our patience. Of course, some of the test candidates are early revisions with BIOS versions partially still in beta stage, thus not completely up to the demands of stable day-to-day use. But on the other hand we especially had quite a hard time to run the extensive benchmark tests under Windows 2000 Professional. Finally we decided to use the workstation version of Windows NT 4.0 SP6a, and ran the benchmark test on this operating system instead, in addition to Windows 98 SE.

Windows 2000 seems to pose some kind of problem to both, VIA as well as NVIDIA. While VIA supplied only some half-baked support to the Win2k package, NVIDIA is unable to release a final Win2k driver for their recent chips, although Windows 2000 is now available for several months already.

The two chips of KX133: On the left the south bridge VT82C686A and on the right the north bridge VT8371.

Follow-up by reading the article ‘VIA’s Apollo KX133 Chipset and Windows2000‘.

Architecture of the KX133 Chipset

At a closer look, only the new north bridge VT8371 differentiates the boards with KX133 chipset from the boards with AMD 750 chipset. Many motherboards with AMD 751 north bridge are already equipped with the new VIA south bridge VT82C686A, that is also used on the Slot 1 or Socket 370 platform for Intel processors. The south bridge VIA VT82C686A is a part of the KX133 chipset as well. The main improvements are in the north bridge VT8371, however: It contains an AGP 4x interface and a memory controller that allows asynchronous clocking to the front side bus and also handles a memory clock with 133MHz. The north bridge of AMD’s 750 chipset does not offer these functions. Another advantage of the VIA chipset compared to the AMD part is the option of using VC-SDRAM modules (Virtual Channel Memory) besides regular SDRAM memory. Here is a main function summary for the VT8371 north bridge:

• AGP 4x interface
• Asynchronous memory clocks of 66, 100, and 133MHz
• Support of SDRAM and VC-SDRAM
• Overclocking of FSB clock to up to 155 MHz (optional)

The south bridge VIA VT82C686A for different platforms (Slot A, Slot 1, Socket 370) principally only offers a few new features:

• Ultra-DMA/66 support for both the IDE channels
• 2 USB hubs with two interfaces each (4 port USB)
• A maximum of 6 PCI and 3 ISA slots
• ACPI support for suspend to disk/RAM
• Optional AMR slot for sound and soft modem
• Hardware monitoring and system management bus

Very rare and almost not available on the market: VC-SDRAM memory is generally supported by all KX133 boards.

The table below shows a general overview of the new features of the VIA KX133 in comparison to the AMD 750.

* uses Double Data Transfer mode thus doubling the effektive FSB bandwidth

The north bridge VIA VT8371 is responsible for the main advantages of the VIA KX133 in comparison to the AMD 750.

A lot of Inconsistencies

We observed the following incidence several times during a test run; it could almost be listed under ‘curiosities’: With some boards (for example QDI Kinetiz 7A and LuckyStar) the initial startup in combination with a GeForce card did not produce a video signal – the system simply failed to boot. Afterwards we replaced the GeForce card with an ATI Rage 128 – the system booted without any complaint. Following this procedure and using the GeForce graphics card again, there were no more problems, however. Obviously not every user has a second or third graphics card available to investigate the cause of a failed system test. We do not have a definite explanation for this phenomenon either.

More inconsistencies occurred with a few test candidates (like for example Asus K7V, LuckyStar) at exactly the moment when we set the jumper for the CMOS delete process after flashing a new BIOS version. Often the ‘old’ BIOS settings remained unchanged or the system refused to boot. Only after removing the battery for the CMOS memory and briefly switching on the board, the settings of the BIOS menus were deleted. We suspect that the CMOS registers of some boards hold the stored data longer than desired even without power supply.

Driver Problems with VIA and Nvidia

After optimizing the BIOS settings the tests ran almost without any problems under Windows 98 SE and NT 4.0. However, we experienced an increasing number of system crashes under Windows 2000 Professional. In addition to that, we had to switch on the AGP support under Windows 2000 Pro with our patched MACHINE.INF – except on the Asus K7V. But testing all candidates under Microsoft’s latest offspring was more like an odyssey: We were unable to guarantee a reasonable and stable test run with any of the newer driver versions (available at www.reactorcritical.com). While driver version 5.13 produced a black screen on a few boards in irregular intervals (for example QDI Kinetiz 7A, LuckyStar K7VA133) during the boot process of the system, version 5.14 showed significant instabilities during operation. Interestingly, the K7V gave the most stable impression. With this board we succeeded in determining all benchmark results – but only after several attempts. As mentioned, the attempts with all other test candidates under Windows 2000 were practically unsuccessful, and we decided to run all OpenGL tests with the GeForce card under the more stable Windows NT 4.0. We do not want to blame the motherboard manufacturers for those problems, because the boards were relatively stable under Win 98 and NT. We think that a missing INF update and a flawed Windows 2000 driver from VIA are responsible. We already contacted several motherboard manufacturers concerning this problem, as well as the chipset manufacturer VIA. We heard indirectly that VIA is actually working on the issue.

BIOS and Overclocking

There are hardly any differences among the BIOS functions of the test candidates. Apart from the Gigabyte GA-7VX that is equipped with an AMI BIOS, all other boards work with an Award BIOS. The differences were more in the number of functions: For example, the Asus K7V and Abit KA7 offer a large variety of special settings for the CPU core voltage, Front Side Bus and memory clock, and therefore appeal to overclockers, the remaining test participants, however, come with more or less standard functions.

Recommended Bios Settings for KX133 Boards

For all users who want to achieve optimum performance in conjunction with high system stability based on a KX133 board, we summarized the most important BIOS settings below. The described functions are principally available on all boards with Award or AMI Bios. The only differences may occur in the combination of the individual features. One major option for the memory performance is the “SDRAM Cycle Length”, a.k.a. “CAS Latency Time”. Memory modules with CL2 (CAS Latency Time = 2) are definitely better and significantly faster then modules with CL3. Operating a memory module with CL3 at a BIOS setting for CL2 endangers the stability of the system. Most memory modules (with CL=3) cannot deal with these short latency times. Another critical option in the “Advanced Chipset Features” menu is the “SDRAM Bank Interleave”. Only few boards offer this function, but it leads to irregular system crashes when activated.

Special Features

An interesting feature of the KX133 chipset is the support of four USB interfaces. All boards have access to this extended functionality. However, the additional interfaces do not change anything regarding the existing bandwidth problems when connecting special peripherals like for example a TV card. Most boards still come with WOL and WOM connectors (Wake up on LAN or Wake up on modem), which are rarely used. On the other hand, the query function for the opening of the housing is very useful, especially for the OEM business. Among all the tested boards only the Chaintech CT-7ATA is equipped with the appropriate pins. The KX133 chipset supports all modern ACPI features (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) to lower the power consumption of all devices and to shorten the boot process drastically. We did not closely investigate both the modes STD (save to disk) and STR (save to RAM).

PC99 Specification

All boards of the test field come with PC99 color-coded connectors (PS/2, COM, sound and USB). Similarly coded connectors are still pretty rare in peripheral devices, however.

All boards in the test field possess color-coded connectors according to the PC99 specification. This standard defines a common color code for parallel, serial, PS/2 and USB interfaces. To be completely PC99 compatible, a board cannot be equipped with an ISA slot anymore. Apart from the Asus K7V, all other candidates have at least one ISA interface.

Completely Unused – The IrDA Interface

In the era of wireless communication more and more peripheral devices possess an infrared interface for data transfer. This includes for example notebooks, cameras, speakers, cell phones or organizers. Every desktop PC based on a standard motherboard could also be equipped with an infrared transmitter/receiver. The majority of the test participants offer an appropriate Fast IrDA interface on board, but the right cable with an IR unit for data transmission is missing. The interesting point: Most manufacturers do not even carry this accessory as an option. There is full support from the operating system side, so we are not blaming Microsoft in this area – Windows 98 SE as well as Windows 2000 offer IrDA support with different transfer standards. With this in mind, it should not be too big of a problem for most motherboard manufacturers to optionally offer suitable cables and sensors. Surely, quite a lot of users would like to synchronize their data from the notebook with the desktop PC via an infrared link. The large PC vendors like Compaq, Fujitsu-Siemens or Hewlett-Packard have recognized this already and equip their systems with full IR functionality.

Neglected and often unused: The IrDA interface is integrated on all boards. However, without the appropriate cable with IR sensor it has no practical use. On top of that: Most manufacturers do not even offer IR units as an option.

Power Consumption at the Limit?

It should be widely known by now, that boards with Slot A for Athlon processors have high power consumption. Just the 1000 MHz version of the Athlon processor itself uses up to 68 watts of electrical power. When a modern graphics card with Nvidia’s GeForce chip is added, the voltage controller on the motherboard operates at the limit. Consequently the circuit transistors heat up very quickly. A weak controller in a fully equipped PC system might reach its capacity limit due to the number of components, which could lead to a system crash or unstable operation. The manufacturers integrated very different controller options on the 12 boards we tested. Epox and Asus, for example, installed a very safe solution by implementing generously designed power transistors and capacitors (controller stage). During the whole test these two candidates had the lowest heat increase. The controller of the Jetway 771AS left a less solid impression: During the test run the temperature of the power transistors increased even with very few peripheral components. Why the manufacturer did not include a heat sink for the transistors remains a mystery.

This is what a strong controller design looks like: The four power transistors of the Epox EP-7KXA are equipped with large heat sinks and only heat up very slightly during operation.

Overclocking Features

Among all test participants only two boards are very suitable for overclocking: The Abit KA7 and the Asus K7V. Both boards allow variable settings for the CPU core voltage and the clock frequencies for Front Side Bus and memory clock via a comfortable BIOS control. But there are also points of criticism with these boards: Above 100 MHz the Front-Side-Bus can only be changed in relatively large steps. A continuously adjustable clock rate would be great, like Abit has already implemented it in the BF6 (board with Intel 440BX chipset). Overclocking fans could then better test the boundaries of their system with an almost continuously adjustable FSB.

A Look at the Test Candidates

Below is the detailed description of the individual test participants as well as a more in-to-depth investigation of important characteristics. We only comment on the special features of the individual boards. An assessment and evaluation of the performance follows after the individual descriptions.

Abit KA7

Abit stays true to its image as overclocking-friendly manufacturer: The “Soft Menu III” of the KA7 offers numerous features for overclocking. The downside: When fully equipped, the six PCI slots quickly generate IRQ conflicts.

The KA7 is the first board for Slot A from overclocking specialist Abit. It is the only candidate in the test field that comes with six PCI slots. However, they generate IRQ conflicts when fully equipped, especially under Windows 2000. The manufacturer did not implement the AMR slot that is found on a lot of the other test participants. With the “Soft Menu III” the BIOS enables elaborate settings for adjusting the Front Side Bus and CPU clock as well as the core voltage. The Front Side Bus scales from 66 to 155 MHz allowing to operate future processors with more than 1 GHz. Because of its special features the board is interesting for overclocking fans and convinces with quite a good performance.

Aopen AK72

Solid basis with layout mistakes: On the Aopen AK72 the power supply connector is too close to the CPU slot. The result: it prohibits using larger heat sinks or fans. Exemplary: The very strong controller.

The AK72 from Aopen is one of the largest candidates in the test field. The packaging of the board is rather average, but it is shipped with an additional cable for two more USB interfaces. A large, colored brochure informs briefly and succinctly about the most important connectors and settings. This clearly differentiates Aopen from the competition: Due to the good description and the colored figures, even the less knowledgeable user can quickly install the board. A strong controller with a total of six circuit transistors allows stable operation. The board is equipped with five PCI slots and one ISA slot. Quite sensibly the manufacturer left out the AMR slot, which is of less interest in this price class anyway.

Asus K7V

A large board with exemplary layout and excellent performance: The Asus K7V is currently one of the best KX133 boards. Due to the AGP Pro slot, it can accommodate even power-hungry graphics cards.

The Asus K7V was one of the first boards on the market with KX133 chipset. The current BIOS versions also convince with stability and good performance. The shipment is quite extensive: Apart from another USB cable for two additional ports, it contains a temperature sensor and mountings for the processor. As the only board in the test field the K7V comes with an AGP Pro slot that offers a stable power supply for appropriate graphics cards via additional pins. While Asus still uses an AMI Bios for the predecessor K7M, the K7V utilizes a BIOS from Award. Similar to the Abit KA7, it offers numerous adjustment possibilities for Front Side Bus clock and CPU core voltage. With a maximum FSB clock of 155 MHz the board can operate CPUs with more than 1 GHz.

Biostar M7MKE

Useful partitioning of space on the Biostar M7MKE: Nevertheless, the labels for the connectors and slots are much too small. The circuit stage looks solid.

The Biostar M7MKE is one of the wallflowers of the test field. It hardly has any outstanding features that outshine the other candidates. Exemplary is the included handbook that contains extensive information about the installation of the board and the settings for the FSB and memory clock. A negative aspect are the tiny labels on the slots and connectors. Biostar did not include a heat sink for the north bridge, so the chip temperature increases significantly during operation. Room for improvement: Unfortunately, the ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) cannot be switched off, with the result that you must permanently live with the energy saving modes under Windows 2000.

Chaintech CT-7ATA

An outstanding feature of the Chaintech CT-7ATA is its dual Bios. This avoids any problems in case of flash errors. The missing labels on the DIP switches are quite annoying, because you need the handbook for the settings. Otherwise the board is rather inconspicuous.

The Chaintech CT-7ATA arrived at the last minute. The board comes in regular packaging; a handbook was not included in the shipment yet. Instead we found a driver CD with a content that was already hopelessly out-of-date when it shipped. The CT-7ATA possesses – similar to the Gigabyte GA-7VX – two Bios memories (Dual BIOS). This avoids a total loss during errors in the flash process. DIP switches set the clock rate for the Front Side Bus as well as the CPU voltage, but they are not labeled. The user can obtain the appropriate settings only from the handbook.

Epox EP-7KXA

The very well readable labels on the connectors are a positive accent. Front Side Bus and memory clock as well as CPU core voltage are set in the BIOS. In addition, DIP switches may be used for adjustments.

The package includes a cable for two additional USB connections, saving the user some costs. The structure of the handbook is rather average, but it contains all important information for the installation and about the connectors on the board. Very commendable are the good and readable labels on all slots and connectors. Quite a few other manufacturers should follow this example. The EP-7KXA does not have a heat sink for the north bridge, and as expected the chip heats up more. The FSB clock may be set with DIP switches or in a BIOS menu. Overclocking friends find clock rates beyond 133 MHz. Boards with revision 0.3 have quite a few problems, which we encountered in a previous test. They are not available anymore. We tested revision 0.4 that is a lot more stable. Nevertheless, the numbering chosen by Epox seems slightly confusing. Many users might think they still obtained a beta board.

Gigabyte GA-7VX

The Gigabyte GA-7VX is equipped with two BIOS memories (Dual BIOS) from AMI. Positive: A plastic snap mounting secures the graphics card. Weak point: The connector labels are partially unclear and too small.

The Dual BIOS function is one of the outstanding features of the Gigabyte GA-7VX. It allows booting with the second BIOS memory, even after a flash error. Not so good are the much too small labels for the connectors. As the only candidate in the test field, the GA-7VX comes with an additional snap mounting for AGP 4x graphics cards. During the test with VCM-SDRAM the board refused to work. A BIOS update will very likely remedy this. Quite remarkable is the extensive controller with four power transistors and a number of capacitors. The board is equipped with a sound chip from Creative that functions as PCI device. Different sources can be linked over a total of three audio connectors and connect to the integrated sound chip.

Jetway 771AS

The inconvenient arrangement of IDE and floppy interfaces is quite apparent on the Jetway 771AS. The labels on the connectors are much too small. Due to missing heat sinks the voltage controller transistors get very hot.

The Jetway 771AS is a very compact board that comes in a slightly poor packaging. The information in the handbook is very brief and at first not always understandable. Already during initial usage the inconvenient arrangement of the IDE and especially the floppy interfaces becomes quite apparent. Other points of criticism give rise to the suspicion that the design of this board has not been properly thought through: The labels on all connectors are much too small, the four power transistors of the controller heat up extensively – a result of missing heat sinks. The shipment does not contain an additional cable for two more USB connections. The FSB clock is set in the BIOS. Besides the five PCI slots, the 771AS has an AMR and an ISA slot.

LuckyStar K7VA133

The LuckyStar K7VA133 offers clock rates of up to 155 MHz for the Front Side Bus. Significant shortcoming: The memory clock cannot be operated asynchronously at 133 MHz with a FSB of 100 MHz. In addition the DIP switches for adjusting the clock rates are not labeled.

Right at the beginning a serious flaw of the LuckyStar K7VA133 becomes apparent: The memory clock can only be set in sync with the clock of the Front Side Bus (e.g. FSB minus 33 MHz). Therefore it is impossible to operate the memory at 133 MHz with a 100 MHz Front Side Bus. Thus the memory can run at a maximum clock rate of only 100 MHz, resulting in a board with a significantly weaker performance than the other test participants. It should be possible to solve this problem with a BIOS update, however. The maximum clock rate of the Front Side Bus is 155 MHz and can be set either in the Bios or with DIP switches. The labels for the latter on the board are incomplete. It is impossible to manually adjust the CPU core voltage. Even though the board supports VCM-SDRAM memory according to the manufacturer, we experienced problems with our NEC memory modules during the test.

NMC 7VAX

The NMC 7VAX is completely identical to the Epox EP-7KXA. All slots and interfaces on the board are arranged sensibly. For overclocking friends: The CPU core voltage may be adjusted in small steps.

In principle the NMC 7VXA has exactly the same layout as the Epox EP-7KXA. Worth mentioning are the large and very well readable connector labels. Commendable is also the extensive and well-structured handbook that is distinctly different to the Epox EP-7KXA guide. With an AGP, AMR and ISA as well as five PCI slots the board offers a good base for PC systems. The strong controller guarantees a stable power supply, even if all available slots are filled.

QDI Kinetiz 7A

On the QDI Kinetiz 7A the connector for the power supply is too close to the CPU slot, making it impossible to use large heat sinks with fan. As the only board in the test the QDI offers a piezo element. The heat sink on the north bridge is secured with a clamp.

Immediately visible is the appropriate packaging of the QDI. The shipment also contains a cable for the two additional USB connections. The quality of the handbook is rather average and leaves the user with a few open questions. The included driver CD should be out-of-date very soon. All clock adjustments can be made in the Bios, but friends of the overclocking will not be completely satisfied. Jumpers activate ACPI functions like save to RAM or the hardware antivirus recognition. As the only board among the test candidates the Kinetiz 7A offers a piezo element that makes buying a miniature speaker obsolete. The QDI comes with the common features: five PCI slots and one AGP, AMR and ISA slot, which is the standard for many test candidates. What we could not explain: In irregular intervals the QDI had problems with the GeForce cards by simply refusing to boot.

Soltek SL77-KVB

Newcomer: The Soltek SL-77KV is a solid board with minor flaws. Downside: The power supply connector is much too close to the CPU slot, and the labels for the connectors could be better. Positive: The controller is equipped with large heat sinks.

This manufacturer has no reason to hide behind the established candidates: The very functional packaging with a large window optically differentiates itself from most test participants. The shipment contains IDE cables (also Ultra-DMA/66), temperature sensors and a CD-ROM with Norton Antivirus and Ghost. Because we had an early test version there was no handbook available yet. Current information can be found on Soltek’s Website. The CPU core voltage is adjustable in small (sensible) steps; the maximum increase is 0.4 Volts. This (safety) function almost completely prevents a fast destruction of the chip.

Noticeable Features among the Test Candidates

Below we have summarized the most important points we noticed with some test participants during the comparison.

On the Aopen AK72 and the Soltek the power supply is too close to the CPU and prohibits using a large heat sink with fan.

A problem with the connector labels on the Gigabyte board: The partially cryptic labels make no sense and are also much too small.

Handbook for the complete product line? Soltek does not offer an individual handbook for every board.

The Asus K7V shipment includes additional USB connectors.

Test Configuration and Benchmark Tests

To conduct a comparitive test that is as practical as possible, we chose components that are currently available on the market. The AMD Athlon with 800MHz is part of the present upper class of x86 processors; 128MByte RAM is now the standard in PC systems. The memory consists of a DIMM module from Crucial Technologies (Micron) with a CAS latency of 2.

We used Windows 98 SE and Windows NT 4.0 Workstation (Service Pack 6a) as operating system platforms. The initial plan was to run all tests under Windows 2000 Pro as well, but we gave up because of the behavior of the Nvidia pre-release driver 5.13/5.14 in connection with the VIAAGP.SYS driver for the VIA-AGP support. Currently only the Asus K7V delivers somewhat reliable results. All other test candidates in the comparison showed instabilities in this case.

For the performance tests we concentrated on benchmarks that especially use the full capacity of the memory and the AGP bus. The following table shows the complete test configuration that is the same for all candidates in this comparison.

Windows 98 SE: Quake III Arena Demo001

The Quake III Arena Demo001 benchmark separates the wheat from the chaff: The Asus K7V clearly leads with a frame rate of about 125 frames per second. Closely followed by the almost equally as fast Abit KA7. On the other hand the boards from Biostar, Aopen and LuckyStar show a lower frame rate with a difference of up to 10 frames per second.

Windows 98 SE: Unreal Tournament UTBench

The UTBench from Unreal Tournament is a good indicator for the D3D performance of the graphics card and thus also for the throughput of the AGP interface. The Asus K7V and Jetway 771AS lead this benchmark with 31.7 frames per second. In total the frame rate differences are not as significant as in the Quake III Arena example.

Windows 98 SE: Expendable Timedemo

The Expendable-Timedemo shows the differences between the individual boards more distinctly again. The Asus K7V is in the lead, while the LuckyStar K7VA133 is in last place.

Windows 98 SE: Advanced Visualizer

The OpenGL benchmark “Advanced Visualizer” from the SPECviewperf 6.1.1 produces almost identical results. There is only a difference of about two frames per second between the fastest and the slowest board – the Asus K7V and the Luckystar K7VA133. This also clearly shows the fill rate limit of the GeForce card.

Windows 98 SE: Design Review

In the CAD program “Design Review” the Asus K7V leads the Abit KA7 by a hair. Again, the LuckyStar K7VA133 ends up in last place.

Windows 98 SE: Data Explorer

Jetway, otherwise more a representative of the middle-class jumps ahead in the OpenGL test Data Explorer (DX-05). Asus, on the other hand, falls back to towards the end in this sub-test.

Windows 98 SE: Lightscape

Finally the Aopen AK72 awakens from its beauty sleep and finishes second. Otherwise the Aopen engineers seem to play it safe. The AK72 runs very stable, but could do much better. Maybe a BIOS update will come to the rescue soon.

Windows NT 4.0: Quake III Arena Demo001

The K7V is the only board breaking the 130 FPS mark in the shooter game Quake III. Here the difference between Win 98 and NT is quite visible for the first time. Under Windows 98 the GeForce only achieves 124,9 FPS. The disadvantage of Windows NT 4 is due to the missing Direct3D hardware acceleration. It makes playing classic DirectX games practically impossible. Quake III is one of the few game titles that use OpenGL as API, and therefore delivers a very good performance. Only Windows 98 and 2000 offer simultaneous hardware acceleration for OpenGL and Direct3D. Thus NT is primarily reserved for OpenGL workstation applications.

Windows NT 4.0: Advanced Visualizer

You can see the jump in the performance chart caused by K7V quite clearly. In this workstation test Asus shows all contestants which direction the wind blows!

Windows NT 4.0: Design Review

Again we observe the performance advantage of the Asus K7V. All other test candidates did not really get their feet of the ground under NT 4.0.

Windows NT 4.0: Data Explorer

The Data Explorer (DX-05) causes fewer contrasts among the leaders, but on the back end we experienced large performance gaps. Biostar and LuckyStar are the losers with results under 40 FPS.

Windows NT 4.0: Lightscape

Light-03 presents an equal middle-field under NT 4, only the Asus K7V has a significant lead again. What Asus shows at the top, LuckyStar performs at the end of the league.

Windows NT 4.0: ProCDRS-02

The Viewperf sub-test ProCDRS-02 wants to separate the wheat from the chaff below 23 FPS. The difference between the winner K7V and the looser LuckyStar is quite significant in this case: 6,3 FPS resembles more than 30 percent!

Final Words

This comparison test shows one thing very clearly: The KX133 chipset is certainly superior to the AMD 750 in terms of performance. Even though most boards still came with early BIOS versions (partially beta), the majority of the tested boards ran stable in day-to-day operations under Windows 98 SE and NT 4.0 – if the BIOS settings were correct. However, the individual candidates displayed significant performance differences: while the Asus K7V and the Abit KA7 are in the lead in almost all benchmark disciplines, the LuckyStar K7VA133 and the Aopen AK 72 end up in last place. At least the slow performance of the Aopen AK72 is counterbalanced by a stable system behavior.

Windows 2000 Pro still shows distinct problems in connection with the KX133 chipset and a GeForce card. The VIAAGP.SYS driver that just does not want to work with the pre-release drivers from Nvidia (Detonator 5.14) at all caused the biggest problems. Here we can just wait for VIA to offer an appropriate driver update that also updates the file MACHINE.INF. On the other hand, we generally did not experience any problems under Windows 98 SE; all boards did the test run without complaints. A word about OpenGL performance: As already known from previous tests, all boards performed slightly better under Windows NT 4.0 than under Windows 98 SE. This is mainly due to the more powerful software architecture of Windows NT 4.0. Fans of games based on the Quake engine are still better off with the old NT platform (and a GeForce card with 5.x driver). Unfortunately NT does not offer any Direct3D hardware acceleration.

Nevertheless, performance is not everything. Other major criteria for motherboards are the features they offer. This includes the number of slots and connectors or a sensible arrangement of all interfaces. On some contestants, like for example the Aopen AK72 and QDI Kinetiz 7A, the power supply connector is much too close to the CPU slot. This makes it impossible to use a large heat sink with fan (maybe as replacement for an insufficient standard heat sink). Other shortcomings are the labels on all connectors and interfaces, that are often much too small. It requires using the handbook for desired clock adjustments.

Another advantage of the KX133 chipset compared to the AMD 750 chipset is the fact, that the memory clock can be operated asynchronously to the Front Side Bus clock. It is also possible to use fast VC-SDRAM modules; they are hardly available on the market, however. We are going to cover the performance gain with VC-SDRAM versus SDRAM memory at a later time in a separate article. As soon as a solution for the Windows 2000 driver problems becomes available, we will inform you about the performance of the test candidates under Microsoft’s latest operating system.

Features Table, Part 1

Features Table, Part 2

Follow-up by reading the article ‘VIA’s Apollo KX133 Chipset and Windows2000‘.